Grammar of the Nuristani Language Prasun (Wasi weri)

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Almuth Degener
• Subject Area: Applied Linguistics, Computational Linguistics
• Term: from 2015 to 2016
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 271862156

The grammar of Prasun (native name: wasi weri), spoken in northern Afghanistan and the least known and most aberrant language of the Nuristani group of Indo-European languages, is known only from G. Morgenstiernes grammatical sketch published in 1949, The Language of the Prasun Kafirs. In the words of the American Nuristan expert Richard Strand, (http://nuristan.info/, accessed: 05.08.2014), Vasi-vari forms with Kamkata-viri the Northern Group of Nuristani languages ... Having undergone radical phonological changes that were probably engendered by influences from the neighboring Eastern Iranian language Munji, Vâsi-vari is phonologically so aberrant that it is totally unintelligible to other Nuristanis. According to Prof. Georg Buddruss ..., Vasi-vari has three dialects: that of the lowest village of usüt, that of the uppermost village of supu, and that of the intervening villages. Buddruss's extensive field data on Vasi-vari remain unpublished; until then we rely on Morgenstierne's (1949) account. - Thanks to funding by the DFG (BU87/14-1,2), the extensive field data mentioned here have been analysed and are currently prepared for publication by Prof. Buddruss and A. Degener. This project ends in November 2014. As a result, ca. 750 pages of texts, German translations, and a glossary, will be published in 2015 in the Harvard Oriental Series. It is on the basis of these texts, as well as numerous field notes, that the grammar of Prasun will be written. The grammar is to contain chapters on the following topics: 1 Phonology 2 Morphology: nominal morphology, verbal morphology, verbal system, compounds 3 Syntax: DOM, relative clauses, coordination, subordination 4 Pragmatics: local morphemes, deictic particles, discourse particles, 5 lexicon: ideophones One important part will be the description of the verbal system. So far it seems the verbal system is based on a threefold opposition: 1) indicative vs. virtual mood, 2) general-actual vs. constative mood in the past tense, 3) differentiation of three tense forms in the indicative and the aorist. There are already first drafts of several chapters of the grammar, but they have to be revised and checked against the textual data. All the examples will be provided with interlinear translation, and there will be an index locorum for the passages quoted from the text edition.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigator: Professor Dr. Georg Buddruss (†)